Hotlinking is an expression that represents the inclusion of images on a given site using direct links. In case you have site A, for example, and somebody creates site B and wishes to include a number of images from your site, they're able to either save the images and then include them on their site or they can simply put links on their website to the images on yours. Thus, whenever a visitor opens Internet site B, site B will steal traffic from your own site A, as the images shall load straight from your website hosting account. This process is sometimes used for documents and other sorts of files as well. If you want to prevent third parties from stealing your content and from using your own website hosting account’s resources, you are able to limit their ability to use direct links to your files on their sites.

Hotlinking Protection in Website Hosting

You can easily shield your content if you create an .htaccess file in the website’s root folder, but in case that you do not have previous experience, you can use our hotlink protection tool. The latter is included with all website hosting package deals we offer and could be accessed from the in-house built Hepsia CP. The protection may be activated in two basic steps - select the domain or subdomain for the site in question, then select if our system should set up the .htaccess file in the primary folder or in a subfolder and you will be ready. You don't need any programming expertise or any experience with such matters, as there shall be nothing else to do. If you want to turn off the protection eventually, you will be able to see all of the sites which are protected within the same exact section of the Control Panel with a Delete button next to each one of them.